A Call To Arms

The Great Hall

Neville’s strange behavior aside, being
a part of Dumbledore’s Army again filled Ginny with more happiness than she had
felt in months. She could feel her worries about her family, Harry, Hermione,
and the rest of the Order of the Phoenix weighing less and less on her with
every meeting. It was easy to stop giving in to fear when she felt like she,
too, was fighting back. So far, they had successfully distributed more than
fifteen flyers bearing news bulletins among the students, thanks to Luna’s
father. Every week he sent her long, rambling letters bearing a secret code
that only he and Luna could understand. She explained to a very curious Ginny
that as a child, she had liked to speak in secret languages with her parents,
who had thought it quite a useful pursuit and encouraged it.

Luna spent hours poring over the
letters. She would make a few pages of notes that were ultimately revealed to
be a list of names of missing Muggles and wizards, or an announcement of the
appointment of a new Ministry official, or a clipping explaining the activities
of the Muggle-Born Registration Committee. She would then give the notes to
Ginny, who would quickly print and duplicate them during meetings of
Dumbledore’s Army. She gave them to the members of the D.A., and in turn they
would spread them secretly around the school. Ernie Macmillan quickly came up
with several clever ways for them to hide the flyers in plain sight. He folded
them into his classmates’ lost textbooks, left them under chairs in the Great
Hall, and stuffed them in suits of armor and behind statues.

The Carrows, enraged that news was
starting to leak in under their noses, did their best to uncover the source of
the bulletins, but had had no success in obtaining a copy; Ginny had cleverly
used Vanishing ink—within twelve hours of their distribution, the ink would
disappear permanently. Tonight, she and Luna sat at a table at one end of the
Room of Requirement, working on the newest letter. The others were lazily
practicing Stunning each other, but were, for the most part, sitting around on
the cushions and chatting. Luna wore a very concerned expression as she circled
words and letters on the rather short note from her father.

“What’s
wrong?” Ginny asked.

“Nothing,” Luna said vaguely. “Daddy
must have been busy this week, that’s all.” She turned the parchment over to
Ginny. “It’s ready.”

“Thanks,” she answered, taking it. She
watched Luna wander over to where Neville sat. He glanced up and caught Ginny’s
eye; she looked away quickly. They had avoided talking about his attempt at
kissing her, though they had remained quite agreeable (if a little distant)
towards each other. She frowned, starting to copy out Xenophilius Lovegood’s
coded note. Luna was right—it was quite short this week.

“Erm—attention! Hey, everybody?”
Neville said loudly, standing up. “I—I was thinking. We’ve been reviewing our
old spells for quite a while, and Luna’s going to try and teach us a
Disillusionment Charm next week. I—uh—I think we should talk about what else we
want to get done. Seamus?”

Seamus stood up. “Tomorrow night I
want to break curfew and write on the walls in the Great Hall. The Carrows
would have no way of getting it down before people saw it at breakfast.”

“Saw what?”
Parvati asked.

“‘Dumbledore’s Army Lives,’” said
Seamus proudly, spreading his hands before him as though he were unveiling a
piece of art. “It’s a great signoff, isn’t it?”

There was
an appreciative murmur.

“You want
us to reveal ourselves so soon?” asked Padma.

“If we expect to get anything done,
it’s about time,” Ginny said from across the room. “These flyers are only going
to do so much. But here, I have a small change.” She had finished writing the
latest newsletter, a list of names of the missing, and brought the sheet to
Neville. “That way, we can connect the graffiti with our papers. It’d be like
one big reveal.”

“Dumbledore’s
Army, Still Recruiting,” he read with a laugh. “That’s brilliant, Ginny!
Really—”

“It’s
like…rising from the ashes,” Hannah said slowly. “We’re still here, they can’t
get rid of us.”

“McGonagall’s
going to kill us,” Neville said to Ginny, who looked away awkwardly.

“She’s been expecting it all along,”
Lavender said dismissively. “She cornered me over a month ago and asked. But
that doesn’t matter, anyway, none of the teachers can legally ask us about
it—not even the Carrows!”

There was a great deal of laughter at
this realization; by their own rule as they had stolen it from Professor
Umbridge, the Carrows couldn’t interrogate anyone from Dumbledore’s Army. This,
of course, wouldn’t stop them from trying, but it seemed a humorous prospect.

“Right—so, I think what we should do
is this,” Neville said. “Seamus is going to divide everyone into pairs. Mixed
Houses,” he said, spotting Ernie as he reached for Hannah’s hand. “That way if
we’re caught, we can break off in any direction and retreat to the common rooms
without attracting trouble for the whole House.”

“We could
do with some of those Shield Cloaks from Fred and George,” said Michael
ruefully.

“I haven’t got much of their stuff,” Ginny
said honestly. “Skiving Snackboxes and Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder…oh, and
half a box of Decoy Detonators.”

“That’ll do for now,” Neville said.
“We’re going to set the prefects together. They’ll be responsible for keeping
any teachers on guard away from the route to the Great Hall.”

“Seventh
years are on tomorrow night,” said Ernie.

“Malfoy,”
Ginny muttered darkly.

Neville nodded. “Right. So…it’ll be
Malfoy and Parkinson, me and Parvati, Ernie and Hannah, and Anthony and Padma.
In that case, I’d like those last three pairs to stick together and be in
charge of creating the distractions. Anyone whose name wasn’t in there, pick a
partner not in your House.”

Susan looked at Michael Corner, who
nodded agreeably, while Terry and Lavender exchanged nods. That left Seamus
with Luna, who gave him a vague smile, and—

“What about
Ginny?” Parvati asked.

Ginny had been so absorbed in watching
everyone else that she had not noticed she was left partnerless. She swallowed.
“I’ll keep a lookout. I’ll get everyone in and out of the entrance hall while
the rest of you are running decoys and keeping the teachers busy.”

“By
yourself?” Neville asked. “I don’t think—”

“I can do it,” Ginny insisted. She
felt a little thrill of excitement at the very idea. “I’ll lead everyone to the
Great Hall and keep watch while they write on the walls.”

“Without
being seen?” he asked.

“Trust me.”
She looked around, hoping for someone to give her a vote of confidence.

The next day passed in a blur of
excitement for Ginny, but unlike the day they had broken into Snape’s office,
the anticipation was not colored with fear. She behaved herself to previously
unheard-of degrees, smiling in a sickly way at Alecto Carrow’s face all through
her double Muggle Studies lesson, and chuckled to herself at the thought of
what Fred and George would say if they could see how amiable she was when
Amycus threatened her entire class with a detention for not sitting down
quickly enough. She bolted down just enough dinner to keep her alert for the
rest of the evening and ran up to Gryffindor Tower. Parvati and Lavender were
waiting for her.

“Do you
have the Decoy Detonators?” Parvati asked.

Ginny threw open her trunk, rummaging
around the bottom beneath her spare robes. “Yes—here.” She thrust the brightly
colored box into Parvati’s hands and kept digging, producing a second box. “And
here, Lavender. This is called Indelible Ink. You’re to give this to everybody
else going into the Great Hall. Make sure they don’t spill it on themselves,
it’s permanent. It stains your skin and the Blemish Remover won’t work on it
for twenty-four hours, so it’d be an easy way to get caught.”

“Right,”
Lavender said seriously.

Ginny sat
back on her heels, pushing her hair out of her eyes. “We want all of this done
in under ten minutes.”

“We know,”
Parvati assured her. “It’s going to be fine.”

Ginny
nodded distractedly, staring into the depths of her trunk.

“Er…okay…come on, Lav, let’s find
Seamus and Neville,” said Parvati. She closed the door behind them as Ginny
continued to sit on the floor. She reached numb fingers into her pocket,
feeling for the only object she carried with her at all times besides her
enchanted Galleon and wand. It was a photograph of Harry—the one she had torn
from the Daily Prophet weeks ago. She
smoothed it out in her lap. He blinked sheepishly up at her, and she smiled. They
were going to make him proud.

Resolved, Ginny reached into her
trunk, pulled out her last small amount of Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder,
and tucked it into her pocket with the photograph, and hurried off to the boys’
dormitory. When she entered, Ginny’s heart constricted. She had seen this room
before, when five people had lived in it. Now, it was down to Seamus and
Neville—Parvati and Lavender sat on the end of Seamus’s bed. Ginny’s eyes
lingered for a moment on the beds she knew had been Harry’s and Ron’s. Dean’s
West Ham football poster was gone from the wall, and like in Ginny’s dormitory,
the empty spaces took up more room than the occupants.

“Our duty starts in an hour, at eight.”
Neville said, drawing her out of her reverie. “You’ll signal us at exactly
eleven, Ginny. I’ve sent everyone else the message to meet in the Room of
Requirement before then.”

Seamus had
taken the inkbottle from Lavender. “This is brilliant,”
he said. “Tell your brothers from me they’re the greatest.” Ginny grinned.

“All right,
all right, let’s focus,” Neville said, sounding harassed.

Parvati
laid a hand on his arm. “Neville, it’s going to be fine. We’ve got it planned
down to the minute.”

Neville met Ginny’s eyes nervously,
and she knew that he was thinking of their break-in to Snape’s office as well.
“That’s what worries me.”

The five of them went downstairs and
arranged themselves in would-be casual positions around the common room. Ginny
sat down at a table with Seamus and opened a textbook, trying to focus on her
essay for Professor Sprout on the Venomous Tentacula. At five minutes to eight,
Parvati and Neville left the common room without looking back at Ginny or
anyone else.

When the
portrait hole swung shut, Seamus caught her eye and grinned. “Got the flyers?”

She nodded, not looking up from her
work, but lifting aside one of her books to reveal the stack of her printed
newsletters, all signed with: Dumbledore’s
Army, Still Recruiting.

“You have
to be careful tonight,” she said under her breath, as a group of fourth years
passed by.

“So do
you.”

Ginny
shrugged. “They haven’t left me bleeding and tied to a tree.”

“Ouch,
Weasley,” Seamus laughed. She stared at him seriously. “Okay. Don’t get worked
up.”

Two hours
crawled by. Mercifully, thanks to the early curfew, the common room was empty
by half past ten.

“Okay, we’ll go together,” Ginny said
to Lavender and Seamus. “Quiet as you can, all right?” They clambered out of
the portrait hole, past the snoozing Fat Lady, who barely twitched as they
scarpered out of sight down the corridor.

It was only a few minutes to the Room
of Requirement, and they were greeted by Terry, Michael, Susan, and Luna.
Lavender showed everyone the Indelible Ink, and Ginny approached Luna.

“Sure you
know how to do this?” she asked.

“We’ll know when I try,” Luna answered
brightly, drawing her wand. “Lavender, you’re first.” Lavender, looking a
little apprehensive, came to join them. Holding her tongue between her teeth,
Luna rapped Lavender hard on top of the head with her wand.

Little by little, Lavender began to
blend in with the bookshelf behind her, and Ginny knew that the Disillusionment
Charm had worked.

Ginny reached into her pocket and
pulled out her Galleon. She tapped it with her wand, and it glowed brighter,
radiating heat, until it said: READY. Luna was moving down the line,
Disillusioning people.

“Good
work,” said Ginny when she had finished with Seamus. “I’ll do yours.”

Luna faced her and closed her eyes.
Ginny concentrated and raised her wand—a moment later, Luna had melted into her
surroundings. “How peculiar,” said her voice. “Lovely work, Ginny.”

Ginny nodded in a satisfied way. She
was not going to be Disillusioned; she had to be able to provide silent signals
for the others. This was risky, but it was the best plan she had been able to
come up with. Everyone else was searching for their partners.

“Lavender,
where are—oh, there—”

“Oi, hands
off, Boot,” said Michael’s disgruntled voice.

“Seamus,
are you there?” asked Luna.

“Ouch,
Luna, that was my foot!”

It was a bizarre sight—or lack
thereof. Finally, at precisely five minutes after eleven, with everyone
properly paired off, Ginny felt the coin in her pocket heat up again. She
pulled it out and consulted it. Neville’s message was short: GO.

Quietly, she opened the door and
slipped out into the corridor, ducking behind a suit of armor. A moment later,
she saw the door shut.

“Ready,”
she whispered.

“Check,”
said Luna. “All clear.”

Very slowly and calmly, Ginny began to
walk down the hall, aware of the six people quietly tiptoeing behind her. She
hugged the shadows; once she had asked Tonks about her training to become an
Auror, and that had been her advice—people
look away from the dark because they don’t want anything to be there. All
the same, Ginny gave a nervous swallow, the memory of her attempt to steal the
sword of Gryffindor searing through her brain. They met no one as they crept
down six floors to the entrance hall, which was dark but for a few flickering
torches. Moonlight streamed across the floor, illuminating the open doors to
the Great Hall.

When she was satisfied that she was
alone, Ginny hid herself behind one of the statues that flanked the doors and
watched the great marble staircase for any signs of life. She looked down at
her watch, hardly daring to move. The group inside had four more minutes.

Suddenly,
on the upper landing of the sweeping staircase, there appeared two figures,
dimly lit by the torchlight.

One of them gave a sudden sneeze; it
was Neville, giving Ginny the signal that all was clear. That meant that the
other figure had to be Parvati.

Ginny didn’t peek out from her hiding
place, just in case, but she was beside herself with excitement. The other
prefects were keeping the teachers busy, and all was going right. She looked
down at her watch. There were only thirty seconds left…

Suddenly, a
cold hand seized hers.

Ginny nearly screamed; she had not
been expecting Luna to come so close to her. Heart hammering, she muttered,
“Everyone here?”

She felt
Luna squeeze her hand again—yes.

“Follow me,” Ginny whispered. She
crept out of her hiding space, keeping an eye on Neville and Parvati, who were
ambling away from the upper landing casually, their backs to Ginny.

Clinging to the shadows, she followed
Neville and Parvati, leading the way down the corridor. They turned a corner,
and she stopped, waiting, holding her breath—Neville sneezed. Ginny nodded and
crept forward.

“Professor
Carrow!”

Ginny’s heart
stopped. She spun about, her eyes darting all over the corridor for the
Disillusioned people behind her.

“Scatter!” she hissed, and a moment
later, she heard the soft rustling that she knew meant Luna and the others had
run off. Ginny looked around—the nearest hiding space was behind an enormous
vase, halfway down the hall.

“What’re
you up to?”

Alecto Carrow’s voice was alarmingly
close. Ginny bolted, reaching the alcove as she heard Parvati and Neville’s
footsteps heading down her corridor. She jammed herself behind the vase and
froze in a crouch, not even daring to breathe.

“We’re finishing our patrol,
Professor,” said Parvati’s voice. They were much closer now, but Ginny couldn’t
chance a peek to see just how close.

Ginny
closed her eyes, holding her breath. She didn’t move. There were several beats
of silence.

“Get on with
ya, then, on with ya,” Alecto said coldly. “And mind it don’t happen again.”

“Right—sorry,
Professor,” said Parvati. A moment later, Ginny heard the sound of hers and
Neville’s departure.

She sucked in her breath further,
hoping Alecto would leave soon, and not inspect the corridor. Ginny didn’t dare
move for almost a full five minutes, straining her ears for the slightest
noise—Alecto seemed to be pacing back and forth.

A moment later, however, she heard the
sound of Alecto’s footsteps stumping away down the corridor. Nonetheless, she
did not move for another five minutes, emerging only when the lighted torches
in the corridor had dimmed, signaling an end to the prefects’ duties.

Quickly and silently as she could
manage it, Ginny darted for the nearest staircase and rushed up seven flights
to the corridor that would take her to Gryffindor Tower.

“—Want to go with you!”

Ginny
nearly gasped in fright—she would recognize that voice anywhere.

“How many
different ways do I have to tell you I’m not interested in taking you?” Draco
Malfoy hissed angrily.

“Draco,”
Pansy’s voice whined.

The voices were coming closer, from
just around the corner of the corridor where Ginny now stood. She looked all
around for somewhere to hide, but there was nowhere in sight. Her heart was
beating wildly in her chest—her only choice was to run as far from Draco and
Pansy as she could.

“If I’m only getting one trip to
Hogsmeade out of the Carrows, then it’s hardly likely that I’d take you, now is
it?” said Malfoy coldly.

Ginny
bolted, sprinting off down the corridor, looking for anywhere she could hide.

“Is this about Daphne Greengrass’
sister?” Pansy demanded angrily. She and Malfoy had rounded the corner, but
Ginny was far ahead, already turned down a new hallway. “That little—”

“Shut up,
Pansy,” Malfoy said suddenly.

“Don’t talk
to me like that!” said Pansy, her voice rising hysterically. “Why are you—?”

“I said
shut up—I think I heard something.”

Ginny froze, looking wildly around for
somewhere to hide. The closest place she could even hope of reaching was the
Room of Requirement, at the end of the corridor. She could still hear Malfoy
and Pansy behind her, ready to turn the corner and stumble across her. Without
thinking for another moment, Ginny took off, reaching the tapestry of Barnabas
the Barmy in seconds.

Let me in! she thought desperately, pacing
rapidly before the blank stretch of wall three times—and then the door
appeared.

“I don’t
see anything, Draco, come on!”

“Quiet!”

Malfoy and Pansy had appeared, just as
Ginny flung open the door. She leapt through into the darkened room and closed
the door quietly as possible, crouched beside the handle with her ear pressed
against the wood.

“There’s
nothing here, Draco! We should have been back ten minutes ago,” Pansy’s voice
whined. There were several beats of silence, and Ginny could almost see
Malfoy’s pale eyes narrowed suspiciously at the blank wall where he knew the
Room of Requirement ought to be. Oh, why hadn’t she remembered that he knew
where it was?

“Fine,” he
said at last. “Let’s go.”

Ginny listened to their retreating
footsteps and breathed a sigh of relief. Then, a pair of hands seized her
shoulders, and she started to scream—and then a hand clapped over her mouth,
cutting her off. She kicked and stomped her assailant’s feet, fighting to get
away—

“Ginny! Ow!
Ouch, you lunatic, it’s me! Lumos!”

“Neville,” she gasped, as a wand tip
ignited, revealing that she had taken refuge inside the D.A.’s darkened
practice room. Neville stood before her, panting as he held his wand aloft.

“Who did
you think it was?” he demanded.

She shook
her head. “You’re supposed to be back in the common room.”

“Parvati and Lavender helped me sneak
out,” he explained. “I’d heard back from everyone but you that they got safely
to their common rooms, and I thought you might’ve been caught after Carrow
cornered me and Parvati. I…” he blushed, looking down at his feet. “I wanted
to…help you. If…you know…you needed it.”

Ginny was feeling rather hot around
the collar. “There’s not much you could’ve done,” she said, annoyed. “Now
you’ve put yourself in more danger, coming here instead of just waiting for
me.”

“How was I supposed to know?” he
asked, sounding hurt. He pulled his Galleon out of his pocket. “You’re supposed
to send a message if you get into trouble—you especially!” Then he paused,
stammering for a moment. “I—I mean, you were the only one who wasn’t
Disillusioned! You could’ve taken the fall for the whole thing! What would they
have done if they’d caught you?”

“Well, they
didn’t, Neville, and in case you haven’t noticed, I can handle myself,” Ginny
snapped.

“That wasn’t my fault!” she burst out.
“Malfoy and Parkinson were out-of-bounds after duties ended, hanging out next
to the Fat Lady! I would’ve been fine if they hadn’t been there! Merlin’s
pants—I’m not a first year! You’ve got some awful idea that I’ll just up and
expire on the floor if I’m not holding someone’s hand for safety!”

“No, I
don’t,” Neville said quietly.

“Are you sure? Because sometimes you
act like I’m made of glass,” she answered, now feeling hot tears sting her
eyes. “And I can ignore it, because I’m used to it—that’s what I’ve got
brothers for. Hell, that’s what I’ve got Harry for, half the time, but when I’m
doing things that I’m more than capable of dealing with on my own—that will only get more complicated when I have a handler,” she spat at him, “I really
kind of hate it.” Feeling tears fill her eyes to her great fury, she turned
away from Neville and marched over to a chair that had appeared, sitting down.

He was
quiet for several moments, unmoving. “That’s why I took you to the ball, you
know.”

Ginny
hastily wiped a tear from her cheek. “What?”

“I took you to the Yule Ball because
you were a lot more independent than I was,” said Neville. “You were a lot
tougher than people saw. It’s why I liked you. It’s…it’s why I do like you.”

It felt as though a hand had seized
Ginny’s lungs and started squeezing. “Neville,” she said. “I—I know…he’s not
here…but—I’m with Harry.”

Neville was staring at the floor. He
nodded. “I know. That doesn’t stop it—how I feel, I mean, but I get it. Well—I
sort of do,” he said. Then he sighed. “I’m sorry I’ve got us in danger tonight.
You’re right, this was my fault, you could’ve gotten back on your own.”

Ginny
folded her arms uncomfortably. “It’s not that big of a deal,” she said. “Come
on, we should—”

“I’m sorry
I tried to kiss you, too,” he said. He came over to where she sat. “I shouldn’t
have done it.”

Ginny sighed and stood, arms still
crossed. She looked up at Neville. “You definitely shouldn’t have,” she agreed.
“But you did.”

“I’m really
sor—”

Ginny held up a warning hand. “Worse
things have happened. That’s it. We don’t need to talk about it anymore.”
Neville nodded, still looking morose, and she gave him a smile. “Really,
Neville, it’s okay.” He gave a slight grin. “Let’s get back to the common room
before another patrol comes our way,” she said, striding to the door and
placing a hand on the knob. She paused, turning back to Neville. “Oh—you
probably shouldn’t try anything like that again, though. You’re my friend, but I will absolutely hex you.”

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